The Art of Deep Purple in Cologne

Ritchie Blackmore, Tommy Bolin, Steve Morse

This coming Friday sees me off on my travels for an exciting 7 days. The first few are dedicated to representing my partner Miki’s art at a Deep Purple exhibition in Cologne, Germany this weekend. She has 9 paintings on show, featuring many DP members, past and present, and artists from all over the world will be exhibiting. Miki will be busy working in Spain at the time so I’ll be seeing to her interests at the launch weekend.

Miki’s website:

Miki de Goodaboom

The venue awaits the exhibits

In addition to the many paintings and sculptures, there will also be a collection of Roger Glover’s basses on display, plus signed items from Joe Satriani and Don Airey. Roger also has a number of his own artworks on display.

Opening night sees a Deep Purple tribute band – ‘Demon’s Eye’ performing too, so I’m looking forward to that, and also catching up with drummer Mark Cross (Scorpions, Firewind) on the opening night.

Roger Glover signs stuff for the exhibition

The Exhibition runs from April 14 to May 12 – if you’re in the area, be sure to check it out!

 

THE ART AND HISTORY OF DEEP PURPLE

 

Kev Moore

Rock under the Sun

My old mate Stef from the UK is over in Spain again, and that means – fun gigs!  So Stef, Mario and I threw a couple of sets of rock together and began by playing Mario’s own Bar Zambra on friday night, followed by El patio beach bar on Mojacar Playa on the Saturday early evning. We had a blast, playing the set by the seat of our pants with virtually no reheasals, and performing songs such as Radar Love, La Grange, One last Soul etc. but by far the most poignant for me was playing the late great Tommy Bolin’s ‘Teaser’. I’d had a message from his brother a couple of days back after I’d tweeted we’d be doing the song, telling me to say it was a ‘special request from his brother Johnny from Sioux city, and to rock it!’ That we did, and it was an honour and a privilege to do so.

We have one more show coming up in the nearby mountain village of Bedar on Wednesday, and I’ll be posting pics etc from both that and the El Patio show later!

Kev Moore

Do people like this REALLY have the vote?

I was wandering around YouTube the other day and came across a video (well, there’s no video, just the music) of Billy Cobham’s Spectrum. It’s a fantastic piece of Jazz Rock from one of America’s foremost drummers. The guitarist on the track is Tommy Bolin, the tragic guitarist who replaced Richie Blackmore in Deep Purple and died from a heroin overdose aged just 26. In the comments section, someone was bleating on and on about how the track was nothing to do with Tommy and it was all Cobham, which is of course, plain rubbish. Cobham may be a great drummer, but this and other tracks he recorded were made by the combined efforts of the musicians he surrounded himself with. Take a listen, and see for yourself. I pointed this out on the comments page, and I received a mail in my YouTube inbox from the guy who dismissed Tommy’s input. It went like this (I’ve added asterisks) The lack of capital letters/grammar/punctuation/proper spelling etc. are all his very own.

tommy bolin/billy cobham

…

tommy bolin/billy cobham

look lets get one thing straight ok i don’t give a f*ck about tommy bolin are you and what you are talking about ok motherf*cker you have a problem with me stop hidding behind the internet and lets do this face to face and see if your are a man are a bitch that i know you really are and anymore about some stinking ass white boy bitch ass motherf*cker

I replied that I found his answer bordered on racism , and reitereated my point that the various guest guitarists used by Cobham and Mouzon significantly contributed to their albums. His reply:

look you must really be in need of someone to talk to i did’t send you a message on the comment i put my comments on in the comments box not to you ok so look it’s like this you keep trying to make your point i have say what i mean and mean what i say so we can keep going back and forth with what you beleave but to tell you the truth i can give a fuck about tommy bolin are you get it it not a matter of race to me as so much for you billy cobham hang with people like roy ayers, stanly clarke,george duke, miles davis, grover washington jr. and i acn go on on wirth this of brothers ok you just trying to fit where you can get in get a son ok that you thank that you can impress not don’t need you sending me anything about jazz music ok i am jazz music and soul and funk and blues gospel and rock & roll and r/b so go pull you hero toomy junkie ass out of the grave and he can be your god ok don’t send me any comments on your god tommy bolin ok i don’t care bitchhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh…

I wonder if the guy takes a breath when he’s writing? I sure couldn’t observe his lack of punctuation and read it out loud from beginning to end without gasping and turning blue. And another thing, is it strictly English? He’s from Baton Rouge. so, all you Americans out there – does it make you proud? Scares the hell out of me!

Kev Moore